Representation of Journalists and the Press in literature, film and TV 1900 – present day
Timetable, Reading, Assessment
Assessed Essay 1 due 9.00 am Monday November 4
Assessed Essay 2 due 9.00 am Monday November 25
Week 1) The Edwardian Period
Guy Thorne, When it was Dark (1903)
P G Wodehouse Psmith Journalist (1909)
Philip Gibbs, The Street of Adventure (1909)
Edgar Wallace, The Four Just Men (1905)
Jerome K Jerome, Tommy and Co (1904)
Dolf Wyllarde, The Pathway of the Pioneer (1906)
John Davidson, Fleet Street (poems 1905 and 1907)
Week 2) Kipling
Rudyard Kipling, short stories The Man who Would be King (1881) and The Village that
Voted the Earth was Flat, in A Diversity of Creatures (1917 – story written 1913/14)
Week 3) WW1
Basic:
Siegfried Sassoon poems ‘Editorial Impressions’ and ‘Fight to a Finish’ in Counter Attack
(1918)
Wilfred Owen poem ‘Smile Smile Smile’ in Poems (1920)
Rose Macaulay, Non Combatants and Others (1916)
Bonus:
Siegfried Sassoon, Memoirs of an Infantry Officer (1930)
H M Tomlinson, All Our Yesterdays (1930)
Week 4) Interwar years Press Barons/popular press
Rose Macaulay, Potterism (1920)
The Pressgoat, anonymous short story in Adelphi, July 1923
Storm Jameson, Company Parade (1934), Love in Winter (1935)
W H Auden poem ‘Beethameer’ in The Orators, 1931
Week 5) Reading/Writing week
Week 6) women journalists
Basic
Graham Greene, Stamboul Train (1932)
Rose Macaulay, Keeping up Appearances (1928)
Some Rita Skeeter/ Julie Burchill’s Ambition/ A N Wilson’s My Name is Legion
If Time/Can find
Christopher Isherwood, Mr Norris Changes Trains (1935)
Week 7) Evelyn Waugh’s Scoop
Evelyn Waugh, Scoop, 1938
Week 8) Reading/Writing Week
Week 9) American Portrayals
(no reading – please by now have watched from a selection of: His Girl Friday (1940),
Philadelphia Story (1940), Citizen Kane (1941) State of Play (2009), Blood Diamond (2006)
and look at comic book heroes, superman and Lois Lane etc)
Week 10) 1945 - 1990
Basic
Graham Greene, The Quiet American (1955)
Michael Frayn, Towards the end of the Morning (1967)
Monica Dickens, My Turn to make the tea (1951)
Week 11) After the last chance saloon
Basic
Ian Banks, Complicity (1993)
Ian McEwan, Amsterdam (2005)
If time
James Meek, We are now beginning our Descent, 2008
J K Rowling, Harry Potter, Books 4 – 7 (Reeta Skeeter)
Julie Burchill, Ambition (1989)
A N Wilson, My Name is Legion (2004)
Week 12) British Film and TV Portrayals
(no reading; please try to watch Defence of the Realm, State of Play (TV), House of Cards
(TV) and A Very British Coup (TV))
Secondary reading
Basic
A J P Taylor, Beaverbrook 1972
Catterall, Peter, Seymour-Ure etc (eds) Northcliffe’s Legacy, 2000
Connelley, Mark and Welch, David (eds) War and Media: Reportage and Propaganda, 1900
– 2003 (2005)
Lonsdale, Sarah ‘A Golden Interlude’ in Parliamentary Affairs, Vol 64, No 2 April 2011
Lonsdale, Sarah ‘We Agreed that Women were a Nuisance in the office anyway’ in
Journalism Studies (online)
Dennis Griffiths, Fleet Street: Five Hundred Years of the Press, 2006
McNair, Brian, Journalists in Film, Edinburgh University Press, 2010
PEP, Report on the British Press, 1938
Richard Shannon, A Press Free and Responsible, 2001
Waugh, Evelyn Waugh in Abyssinia, 1936
PLUS…THE LIBRARY IS FULL OF HSITORY BOOKS ABOUT JOURNALISM. ANY
OF THESE WILL HELP PROVIDE CONTEXT FOR YOUR ESSAYS…See Module
outline for full list
Assessment:
Two assessed essays to be submitted on the dates specified above. Undergrads: 2,000 words,
Postgrads 3,000 words (45 per cent) Essays must be proper academic essays with Harvardstyle footnotes. Footnotes NOT included in the word count.
A two/three hour exam where you will be required to answer essay questions (45 per cent)
In-class seminar contribution (10 per cent)